Haspel Suits Have Been Popular with Presidents and in Hollywood
- 04/04/2005
By Karen Martin, Assistant People Editor
View the Original Article Here
The Haspel clothing line, which is locally owned by the Lipsey family, is about keeping old traditions and starting new ones.
Ask Laurie Lipsey Aronson.
She's carrying on a rather strange mix of family traditions. Aronson, 38, serves as president of both Haspel and Lipsey's Inc., one of the world's largest wholesale distributors of guns.
"I have a pistol on this side of my desk and fabric swatches on this side," said a laughing Aronson, sitting at her desk in the large, open offices of Lipsey's on Exchequer Drive. "Really, it depends what day of the week it is what I'm doing. I spend most of my time with Lipsey's, but in the past two years I've been super active with Haspel."
Few people could straddle the line so easily. Aronson, for example, loves duck hunting, and was just named to the Best Dressed list by the Capital Sertoma Club.
Her great-grandfather, Joseph Haspel Sr., and his three brothers started the company, known for its seersucker suits, in 1909 in New Orleans. Originally, Aronson said, seersucker was used to make overalls for the working man.
It wasn't until the 1920s that the lightweight fabric was stitched into a suit that would change the face of men's fashion. Seersucker offered an alternative, albeit it a wrinkled one, to the heavy woolen suits most businessmen of the time favored.
The company rocked along, making inroads not only in the business and political worlds -- U.S. presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman were reportedly great Haspel fans -- but also in Hollywood. The company touts photographs of such stars as Gregory Peck, who donned a seersucker for his courtroom scenes in "To Kill a Mockingbird," and Cary Grant, who wore one in "Charade," as well as Humphrey Bogart and Cary Grant.
There's the famous story in the family of how in the early 1950s, Joe Haspel Sr. changed the blend of the seersucker, adding synthetic fibers to make a wash-and-wear suit.
"He walked into the ocean, took it off and let it dry and wore it to a party that night," Aronson said. "It made Haspel suits famous."
Famous, but not impervious to change. In 1977, the family sold the company.
"There was no one to run the business," Aronson said.
The label continued, but went through several hands before Richard Lipsey, Aronson's dad, purchased it in late 1994.
"The brand had become diluted. It was part of a group that had many brand names, and they weren't doing a good job with any of them. There was no marketing, no real feel for the product," Lipsey said. "We decided to let the goods that were out there dry up for a couple of years, then we picked a new manufacturer and got a fresh start.
"We wanted to do it right -- to go into men's specialty stores and to better department stores. We wanted to establish a premiere line of goods, but at a moderate price."
Today, Haspel is sold at 500 specialty retailers across the country, as well as major department stores such as Macy's and Lord & Taylor.
Lipsey licensed the label to Neema Clothing Ltd., which produces garments for a number of labels, including Jeffrey Banks and Halston for men.
"They have experts who pick the fabric and do the design," said Aronson. "But we do have input. We go up to New York several times a year."
"We approve the style, the fabric, the marketing," said Lipsey.
And, as in the old days, Aronson wants Haspel to be the "it" look with Hollywood.
"We've gotten a lot of suits on celebrities in the past two years," said Aronson, who credits a high-powered public relations company with getting Haspel featured in such magazines as GQ, Esquire, Cargo and Men's Journal.
Aronson, herself, has called on the wardrobe people at Warner Bros. in Hollywood, resulting in Haspel suits showing up on prime-time players in such shows as "The West Wing," "ER" and "Third Watch."
Most recently Aronson worked with Luke Wilson on his new film, "The Wendell Baker Story."
"It's all about a guy and his seersucker suit," said Aronson. "The suit was his identity."
In the film, which came out earlier this month, Wilson plays an ex-con who gets a job in a retirement hotel. He also directed the film.
Through such high-profile endorsements, Aronson hopes to introduce Haspel to a new generation.
"I enjoy doing both," she said of her dual roles in fashion and guns. "They're equally enjoyable, but very different."
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